Of course this would never have let 94.7 be used as a high power frequency in Geelong, which I think has always been part of the planning.
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Commercial Radio Australia is claiming that Australian audiences are turning to radio as a critical source of information, entertainment, and connection during the COVID-19 crisis.
According to audience listening figures compiled by GfK, close to 3 in 4 Australians 18+ are listening to radio the same amount or more during the pandemic.
People listening to more radio via their respective devices include 52% of smart-speaker listeners, 32% of AM/FM listeners and 27% of DAB+ radio listeners.
Source: Radioinfo
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What thread do we discuss 621 AM Bunbury, the former SWM station acquired by SCA but to be divested?
What is on that station at the moment?
With the pandemic, has it slowed the sale process?
Am disappointed West Coast Radio (Mandurah stations) had no appetite to buy ahead of a likely conversion to FM when the re allocation is complete.
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An article from Radioinfo about the importance of regional commercial radio stations, in which it derived from an interview between Super Radio Networkās Marcus Paul & Federal Labor MP for Hunter, Joel Fitzgibbon.
Have a read here: https://www.radioinfo.com.au/news/regional-commercial-radio-stations-critical-our-social-fabric
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Iām putting this here as it spans across a couple of networks.
In a discussion in a Facebook group about AM Stereo, it has been mentioned that 4AK, Brandonās ex station in Toowoomba, will be back broadcasting in AM Stereo by the end of 2020, along with sister station 4WK which will be great, but then an engineer with the Breeze/Rebel network pipes up & says, his network will be introducing a new commercial station on AM 1620 in Toowoomba by the end of 2020 also, & broadcasting in AM Stereo. (Not sure how it can be a commercial licence using a narrowband frequency, but then Rebel & Breeze have special commercial licences for all their other transmitters anyway).
This will give Toowoomba 3 stations broadcasting in AM Stereo, which in further discussions, is thought that it may be the most stations in the one market in AM Stereo at this time.
Thereās quite a few stations in the US coming back to AM Stereo now too, including I believe WYLD 940 who will be turning on their new AM Stereo Nautel TX with in the next few weeks. Not a huge format in Gospel music, but if a big network owner like iHeart Media (ex Clear Channel Communications) are willing to invest in it, there must still be life in AM Stereo.
And I know you say thereās no receivers to listen, but with SDR you can listen to C-Quam AM Stereo, & many SDR receivers (like those in cars, etc. that can do AM, FM, DAB+, DRM will be able to do AM Stereo also).
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Some HD AM radios can also decode AM stereo. Not that thereād be any in Oz. Unless you happened to have one you bought in the US. Like me!
Only issue is that those AM HD radios are not wideband. So you lost a lot of the advantage of better sounding audio.
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I know Brandon had mentioned he was working to get 4AK back in stereo but figured it had just fallen by the wayside. Glad to hear it might still be a thing - being one of the few CHR stations on the AM band itās surely logical to get that in stereo
The 1620 service being in stereo is interesting too, presumably itās a product of the newer TXs having stereo option inbuilt? The onyl problem there will be the older tuners (like my ST-JX220A) only go to 1602, but there would be some like the old analog dial ones that you could wind up that far
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Yeah we have been trying our best to get 4AK back into C-QUAM but with the few techs we have and the amount of stations we have to look after we never seem to get time to do it and sadly it keeps getting put on the back burnerā¦
Might be my EX station for now but I am still giving them remote support from NZ and have plans to go back after all this Covid-19 winds down at this stage, unless magically I end up in NZ Radio which I doubt lol 
It has been interesting to see how many people have messaged or called 4WK to say that they are listening in AM Stereo, far more C-QUAM receivers still out in thew wild then expected.
Could be interesting, I know he was running a music loop for a little while on 1620 after he took over the license.
It also also caught my attention aswell that most existing AM Stereo receivers only really went to 1602khz and not up to 1620, so not sure how many listeners he will get in Stereo
I am told that some Jeeps that have the HD capable radios in them are been able to decode C-QUAMā¦ 4WK has a listener this way, as his Jeep gets 963 in Stereo
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bear in mind that most HD radios tune in 10khz steps, so listening to some 9khz channels is impossible & whilst you could still receive 4WK tuned to 960khz, it may not decode stereo
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Luckily my portable AM HD radio has switchable steps. Apparently the Phillipines does HD AM and is 9kHz based of course.
Mind you there are hardly any AM HD portable radios for sale in the US. You certainly wonāt find them in any chain store. Even Best Buy.
And most car radios there are only capable of HD on FM.
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Yes Iām very reliably informed 1620 in Toowoomba will be Breeze and will be AM stereo. In fact test transmissions have begun. Itās certainly a great development. Toowoomba has some great listening options.
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Absolute long shot but has anyone got some old Newcastle radio recordings from the early 2000ās?
n either further long shot looking for a Maitland Toyota commercial from that time too.
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Imagine if SCA were successful in getting that other licence from the TAB.
Potentially could have been Triple M Launceston (Or Heart 90.1 back then), just a mirror of the Hobart Station, and LAFM, utilizing the log as 7AD/7BU.
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whilst I have a DX recording of KO-FM from 2001, it didnāt feature any commercials. Interestingly they played the song āLittle Jeanie - Elton Johnā - a rarity!
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I think a Hit 90.1 would have been more likely.
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If that were the case, then LAFMās music format would more like 7HOās rather than that of 7AD/BU.
You wouldnāt hear āLittle Jeanieā on any commercial FM station in Australia these days, except maybe on Breeze or XLFM.
There is/was an extended aircheck recording of 2GO from June 1996 that played the song as well.
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Maybe not now, but that songās been on many a playlist over the years in Newcastle, probably one of the most played Elton John songs around here.
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Interesting hearing the different audio quality for radio presenters currently hosting from home.
The codec that SEN use seems to require a reboot or re-connection every hour or so. Gerard Whateley has just gone to an ad break because his audio has deteriorated. The same happened during Dwayne Russellās show last week. Still audible but light static and low-fi sound.
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anyone else sick of radio stations not supplying a complete program guide on there website?
a few examples:
97.3 - shows NOTHING for saturdays, and only the IHeartRadio countdown on sundays.
4KQ is marginally better - at least they have something on a saturday
Triple M Brisbane has no program guide, just shows listed, as does itās stablemate B105
nova is a little better but once again nothing on weekends.
probally the best in supplying programming info is vision - see https://vision.org.au/radioguides/ for there pdf guides which are pretty comprehensive.
surely itās not that hard to have a good program guide on a website
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Yeah absolutely.
SCA is the worst, they often have overlapping timeslots in their shows, particularly in the regional stations. hit Gippsland claims that Maddy is on 10am-3pm, & that Aaron is on 9am-12pm. A lot of their stations also have a heap of random programs that were one off programs a year ago that have just been left on there. Looks really messy and is practically useless.
None of the networks seem to want to tell you what jocks are on across the weekend either? Most stations have the same presenter on at the same time each week, so why not just put it on their website? It would take like 30 seconds.
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